June 09, 2013

ANAHEIM, CA (PTC/User 2013), June 9, 2013 - In the war between the two superpowers of CAD graphics, AMD FirePro has scored a major victory over NVIDIA's Quadro -- at least for the PTC Creo crowd and according to AMD's spokesman Antoine Reymond, Antoine flagged me down on the opening of the annual PTC user group meeting.

The setup at PTC's annual user meeting where AMD claims to have beaten NVIDIA soundly.

Openings of big CAD user meetings are usually excuses to eat and drink. Held in the expo hall with the hopes of uniting users with vendors' products and services, most users are occupying themselves with the chicken quesadillas, cheeseburger sliders, wings, crab cakes, more. Most wandered from one food station, had beer, a few had wine. Drink coupons were included with registration, though press may have been denied. (Do we have a reputation?)

But the ever-alert Antoine was not swayed by temptation. Here was a leapfrog in performance over an archrival, an opportunity not to be squandered. It was a story that must be told. No matter that it was Miller time, a Sunday, with the show floor about to close.

And I was happy to oblige. What is more fun to cover than a good fight? NVIDIA, the marketing heavyweight, seems to be outspending AMD to promote its superiority in the battle for the CAD workstation. But Antoine is telling me the AMD Firepro W7000 is up to 17 times faster than the NVIDIA Quadro K4000 in showing a GPU accelerated transparency mode. His colleague, Jon Clark, quickly adds that other modes are also substantially improved. And to prove it, AMD shows otherwise identical systems side by side. Sure enough, the AMD system does appear to be a bit smoother with less glitches as it rotates Creo models.

The technical advantage AMD seems to have attained is not without some intrigue. Antoine tells me PTC allowed AMD exclusive access for one full year. It's the only way they could have gained such a clear advantage.

Oh, boy. I can't wait to get over to get to the NVIDIA booth tomorrow.